Flick Fest, the primary fundraising event for the Highland Park Literary Festival (HP LitFest), will feature acclaimed screenwriter and two-time Academy Award nominee, David Magee. It will be held Thursday, January 30, 2025, at 7 p.m. at the Angelica Theater in Mockingbird Station. Flick Fest will offer a showing and discussion of movies from which David has written screenplays, including “Life of Pi,” “Mary Poppins Returns” and “Finding Neverland.” Donations of $35 or more include the movie screening, discussion, a beverage and popcorn. Doors will open at 6 p.m. Visit https://hplitfest.com/flick-fest/ for reservations and additional detail.

Now celebrating its 30th year, HP LitFest is a premier literary event dedicated to inspiring and engaging students and the greater Dallas community through the power of language in its many forms. Founded in 1995 by Highland Park High School (HPHS) faculty and parents, HP LitFest has grown into a highly anticipated two-day festival featuring enriching programming for students and the community alike. This year’s highlight is a keynote community event on February 20, 2025, featuring Mark Sullivan, New York Times bestselling author of Beneath a Scarlet Sky and former investigative reporter. The event will be held at the HPHS Auditorium, with doors opening at 6:30 p.m. and the program starting at 7 p.m. Admission is free and open to the public. For more information, visit https://hplitfest.com/.

North Dallas diners have a new favorite destination for sophisticated sips and shareable bites. Palate, a charming and intimate venue where the comfort of connection and the delight of shared experiences shine, is now open at 17390 Preston Road, Suite 246, in Dallas.

Owners Tom Burt and Christopher White felt like all the pieces fell into place when they decided to create a wine bar and bistro adjacent to Lekka Retail Concepts, their popular gift and home décor store. After relocating to Preston Trails shopping center in 2023, they collaborated with the landlord on the vision for the space.  A store customer, Roger Pavlovich, agreed to partner with them on the design and buildout.  Most importantly, two separate store customers introduced them to their executive chef, Eddie Ledesma-Porter, and general manager, Zach Zielke. It was as if it were meant to be.

But it took more than a series of chance happenings to create Palate. It took intentionality and attention to detail to create this beautiful jewel box of a restaurant. While neither Burt nor White had a background in restaurants, they knew what they wanted Palate to be. As residents of the North Dallas neighborhood where the restaurant is located, they wanted to create a place with a sense of community.

“We wanted a place where we could not only bring our friends, but a place where everyone could make new friends,” explained Burt.

White’s background includes decades with America’s top retailers, including Macy’s, Saks Fifth Avenue and JCPenney. Burt’s career has been in human resources, most recently with Children’s Health.

When the pair acquired Lekka Retail Concepts in 2018, they purposefully found ways to partner with the local arts community, and that artistic inspiration is a clear part of the Palate vision as well. The restaurant’s name references both a culinary palate as well as an artistic palette. The restaurant walls are literally a gallery of local art, all of it for sale. Eclectic hand-blown glass chandeliers bring light and energy to the space. A collection of Ginkgo trees create a sense of space above a wishing well-inspired space for wine corks, collected to preserve memories created while at Palate.

Finding Chef Eddie Ledesma-Porter was a real catalyst for the project. A CIA graduate and certified sommelier, Ledesma-Porter brought an impressive culinary history and a shared vision for the space. Previous experiences at Ritz-Carlton and Cameron Mitchell Restaurants (Ocean Prime) gave him an appreciation for gracious hospitality and fine dining. However, the casual intimacy of Palate allowed the chef to create a menu that celebrates flavor while engaging diners in a more social surrounding.

“Food is meant to be shared,” Ledesma-Porter said. “Seeing Tom and Christopher’s vision for Palate, it was clear that we needed to create a menu designed to create a sense of community brought together by great food.”

While the restaurant offers a complete menu of craft cocktails, the team wanted to celebrate the role that wine can play in a culinary experience.

“For us, wine became the canvas, and food became the paint,” Burt said, echoing the premise behind the restaurant’s name.

Palate’s shareables menu runs the gamut from Mediterranean-inspired dishes like rustico meatballs, Tuscan hummus and patatas bravas to wine country staples such as duck confit sliders, citrus-marinated olives and whipped goat cheese. A curated collection of flatbreads brings big flavors, including a homemade sausage and sage and a pork al pastor with a warming ancho tomato sauce, caramelized onion and lime crema.

An ample array of salads and soups provides the perfect lunch menu. Favorites include a signature house salad with caramel spiced walnuts, goat cheese, tart apple and a Champagne vinaigrette, and a Sirtaki Greek salad, named for the acclaimed dance of that region. Soups include a Southwestern-inspired chicken tomatillo and a creamy vegan cauliflower cashew soup. A collection of handhelds rounds out the entrees.

The restaurant offers a rotating menu of desserts, including the Palate cookie box, a selection of three different house-made baked treats designed to be taken home or eaten in the restaurant.

“So often at the end of the meal, you’re not prepared to have a dessert,” noted White. “However, once you arrive at home, it’s nice to have that little nibble to end the day perfectly.”

The menu offers real meal options for those who are gluten-sensitive, vegetarian or vegan.

Ledesma-Porter is particularly proud of the range and diversity of the wine selection on Palate’s menu. His favorites include a Pierre Sparr Cremant carefully made with whole cluster fermentation and Argyle’s Bloom House Pinot Noir. The restaurant even offers an acclaimed Châteauneuf-du-Pape at under $100 per bottle.

“Every bottle of wine tells a story, and food should also tell a story,” Ledesma-Porter said. “We want to craft it with some love and take our time to make sure that it is delicious and right.”

Palate is open from 11 a.m. to 9 p.m. Wednesdays and Thursdays, 11 a.m. to 10 p.m. Fridays and Saturdays, and from 11 a.m. to 3 p.m. Sundays. The restaurant is closed Mondays and Tuesdays. Reservations can be made at PalatebyLRC.com.

Palate by LRC

17390 Preston Rd., Suite 246, Dallas, TX 75252

(972) 863-8182

PalatebyLRC.com

The Last Bookstore on Earth

by

Lily Braun-Arnold

YA dystopian tale with a twist!

The Last Bookstore on Earth is a new YA dystopian/speculative fiction novel from Lily Braun-Arnold, and it offers a fresh twist on the plethora of end-of-the-world-as-we-know-it tales. While Liz, the main character, has suffered the loss of her family, friends, and the life she knew (like everyone else in the story), she retreats to the only place of safety she knows left standing (the local bookstore where she had an afterschool part-time job). She creates a little beacon of “normal” for others as she continues to open the store daily, offering book recommendations and a place to leave messages. However, as a repeat of The Storm looms on the horizon, the bookstore faces a much more imminent threat. A small group of organized survivors are out for revenge against her new partner, and they’ve tracked their prey to the bookstore’s doorstep. 

Liz Flannery is the unusual protagonist of the story. She and her twin, Thea, were only a few weeks away from heading off for their first year of college when The Storm arrived, changing everything. Liz was the only one in her small family to live through it and suffered the burden of survivor’s guilt and more. When circumstances allowed, she fled to the familiar safety of her workplace and the comfort and companionship of another coworker who apparently had the same idea. 

Liz, escaping her grief and guilt, is content with the setup and begins to feel a responsibility to maintain the facsimile of normal operations for the occasional survivor who happens upon the open store. Eva, though, chafes to escape the claustrophobia of the routine and her feelings of responsibility for Liz, and she abruptly abandons her. Locals and transients alike express their gratitude and appreciation for the continued existence of the story and their ability to leave messages there for friends and loved ones and trade supplies for what they need, which keeps Liz from ever having to forage through the rubble and death of her New Jersey hometown. Their generous offerings, though, isolate her further and keep her from understanding just how much the world outside the bookstore has changed for the desperate. 

The plot just gets established when rumors that another storm is headed their way. Customers leave messages for those coming behind them and urge Liz to evacuate; the store was greatly damaged in the first storm and is unlikely to withstand another. But Liz sees a solution to leaving her safe place in the appearance of Maeve, a drifter about her age, who breaks in one night looking for shelter and salvage and claiming to be able to make the necessary repairs to the building. Maeve, having started her journey in New York City, knows how much life has devolved and has had her run-ins with some of the more organized survivors. She’s tougher and more aggressive than the passive, polite Liz, but they eventually form an attachment and help each other work through the past year of trauma and scramble to prepare for the coming storm. 

The author can certainly tell a mesmerizing tale! I read this in one enjoyable evening with no regrets after staying up way past what was prudent in order to reach the finish. The story’s pacing kept me engaged, and I needed to see what happened next. The vivid descriptions of the settings created strong visuals, placing me in the scenes firsthand. Characters are well-developed, and I felt sympathy for even those I didn’t particularly care for or agreed with their actions. I was delighted by the premise, a bookstore all to oneself, but in a Twilight Zone-style twist, staying open for business as usual as the society around it collapses, creating a little island of “normal” and a haven of familiarity, comfort, and even, safety for those left behind. Liz’s collecting the stories of the survivors willing to share them with her was an absolute bonus. 

I recommend THE LAST BOOKSTORE ON EARTH to readers of young adult post-apocalyptic and dystopian fiction, especially those who enjoy a positive LGBT, however low-key, representation. 

I voluntarily reviewed this after receiving an Advanced Review Copy through TBR and Beyond Book Tours.

J.L. Long 6th grade Spring Soccer registration time is here!  League play is through the YMCA.  The team is co-ed and open to anyone attending JL Long or any nearby school.  Players can be of any skill level including beginners.  Registration is now through February 9^th, late registration fees will apply after this date.  The Spring teams first practice will be on February 11th and scheduled games will begin Saturday March 1st. This Past Fall, our team finished in 5^th place out of 13 teams!  Come join in the excitement of Soccer season!

 The team will consist of 14+ players and will be co-ed.  All skill levels welcome.  Everyone will have a chance to play! The team practices are at Winter Willis (Randall)  Park across from Woodrow Wilson High School from 4:30 PM to 6:00 PM on Tuesdays and Thursdays.  Games are mostly played on Saturdays.  Under UIL Rules, sixth grade students cannot participate in school team sports, so this is a fantastic opportunity for children to stay active. 

This Spring, we are inviting 5th graders from our feeder pattern schools to play as well.  If we get enough players, we may have 2 teams this Spring!  

Cost is $100 for Y members and $120 for non-Y members through the White Rock YMCA or you can also register with the Richardson YMCA where cost is $85 for Y members and $110 for non- members through February 9th.  The White Rock YMCA is offering uniforms with their registration, the Richardson YMCA is not.  Scholarships are available.

  To register, you can go in person to the White Rock YMCA at 7301 Gaston Ave Dallas, TX 75214  and register under JL Long Buccaneers (Coach Aves)  OR you may register online athttps://dallas.recliquecore.com/programs/82300006/soccer/#division_80101062 . For more information contact Victor Aves at 214-616-0194 or vaves@pegasusrealtyinc.com OR the White Rock YMCA at 214-328-3849 or Richardson YMCA 972-231-3424